Thinking of trying a 2 amp live setup…

[spawnofthesith]

I’ve kind of tossed the concept around in the back of my head for a while, but now with two marks it’s almost starting to make sense…. Maybe lol

I do a ton of live looping with my band, sometimes things can get a little mushy with multiple loops and me playing at the same time. my idea is to reroute one of the outputs on my RC500 to go to the FX return of the other amp. I’m thinking mark V for what I’m playing and mark IV power section for the loops. Seems like this might provide a bit more clarity in sound, and while the concept of bringing two amps might be irritating to a sound guy, seems like giving them more control over the layers might actually be a plus in their eyes for mixing.

The only unfortunate thing is that the irc500 is currently routed to send our click track out. That would have to be sacrificed to make this work. That said, the band has already been tossing around the idea of getting a midronome to function as the master clock/click, so not too big of a deal

Am I being crazy or missing something here or does this sound like a reasonable concept?

Aside from being a pain in the ass bringing double the gear

[broslinger]

Last time i brought two amps, one quit working, so i guess it was a good call.

[Guitarbilly]

Last time i brought two amps, one quit working, so i guess it was a good call.

[Guitarbilly]

I had an epic 2 amp setup in the early 2000s: a Mesa Mark III head and 4x12 for crunch and lead and a Fender Super Twin (which is a Twin with a 180w power section ) for cleans and crunch with a Ibanez Tube King pedal driving it. It was glorious BUT!!:

1- an absolute nightmare to carry to gigs, load in/out, set up etc.
2- soundguys NEVER got the mix between the 2 amps right. It was always out of balance out front somehow and drove me crazy.

3- listening to recordings of the shows, it didn't make THAT much of a difference out front through the FOH. It was more for me on stage but in the mix, I got very similar results with a simple channel switching amp

So idk, it's a good experience and definitely can sound great, especially on stage but I don't think I'd do it again unless I had a crew and our own sound guy that's familiar with the band sound and the mix.
For club gigs, simpler is usually better.

[Guitarbilly]

As for the looping I'd suggest splitting the output to a DI box and straight to the front of the house. Send the DI through output a small FRFR monitor if you need additional monitoring on stage. Or to your IEM system.

[spawnofthesith]

I hadn't even thought about the backup solution aspect

I had an epic 2 amp setup in the early 2000s: a Mesa Mark III head and 4x12 for crunch and lead and a Fender Super Twin (which is a Twin with a 180w power section ) for cleans and crunch with a Ibanez Tube King pedal driving it. It was glorious BUT!!:

1- an absolute nightmare to carry to gigs, load in/out, set up etc.
2- soundguys NEVER got the mix between the 2 amps right. It was always out of balance out front somehow and drove me crazy.

3- listening to recordings of the shows, it didn't make THAT much of a difference out front through the FOH. It was more for me on stage but in the mix, I got very similar results with a simple channel switching amp

So idk, it's a good experience and definitely can sound great, especially on stage but I don't think I'd do it again unless I had a crew and our own sound guy that's familiar with the band sound and the mix.
For club gigs, simpler is usually better.

That sounds epic

In terms of just using a DI, that sounds way less sexy, but I guess might be worth giving a shot (and I could test it out in the practice space too, pretty sure my drummer has DIs laying aroundd). Question - I would probably want to use my IR loader with that method for the direct signal, correct?

[greatmutah]

A local music store has a Super Twin in stock. I’m half tempted to go put it through its paces. I’ve known the store owner since I was a kid so I’m sure he’d let me too hahaha. 180 watts though! I know the Nuge used to run 6 of them onstage or something stupid like that.

[Guitarbilly]

I hadn't even thought about the backup solution aspect

I had an epic 2 amp setup in the early 2000s: a Mesa Mark III head and 4x12 for crunch and lead and a Fender Super Twin (which is a Twin with a 180w power section ) for cleans and crunch with a Ibanez Tube King pedal driving it. It was glorious BUT!!:

1- an absolute nightmare to carry to gigs, load in/out, set up etc.
2- soundguys NEVER got the mix between the 2 amps right. It was always out of balance out front somehow and drove me crazy.

3- listening to recordings of the shows, it didn't make THAT much of a difference out front through the FOH. It was more for me on stage but in the mix, I got very similar results with a simple channel switching amp

So idk, it's a good experience and definitely can sound great, especially on stage but I don't think I'd do it again unless I had a crew and our own sound guy that's familiar with the band sound and the mix.
For club gigs, simpler is usually better.

That sounds epic

In terms of just using a DI, that sounds way less sexy, but I guess might be worth giving a shot (and I could test it out in the practice space too, pretty sure my drummer has DIs laying aroundd). Question - I would probably want to use my IR loader with that method for the direct signal, correct?

Yes definitely so you have cab emulation in the DI loop signal. If your IR has a balanced out and a pass-through jack then you don't even need a DI box.

[zozobra]

You could pick up a captor and run it in pass thru mode so the live guitar goes to the cab with no attenuation, then run the output of the captor to the looping stuff so you're still getting the full tone of the amp in the looped signal. You can then slap an IR on and pass it to FOH/monitors. A bit sexier than just splitting from the FX loop and not much more effort

[spawnofthesith]

I hadn't even thought about the backup solution aspect

I had an epic 2 amp setup in the early 2000s: a Mesa Mark III head and 4x12 for crunch and lead and a Fender Super Twin (which is a Twin with a 180w power section ) for cleans and crunch with a Ibanez Tube King pedal driving it. It was glorious BUT!!:

1- an absolute nightmare to carry to gigs, load in/out, set up etc.
2- soundguys NEVER got the mix between the 2 amps right. It was always out of balance out front somehow and drove me crazy.

3- listening to recordings of the shows, it didn't make THAT much of a difference out front through the FOH. It was more for me on stage but in the mix, I got very similar results with a simple channel switching amp

So idk, it's a good experience and definitely can sound great, especially on stage but I don't think I'd do it again unless I had a crew and our own sound guy that's familiar with the band sound and the mix.
For club gigs, simpler is usually better.

That sounds epic

In terms of just using a DI, that sounds way less sexy, but I guess might be worth giving a shot (and I could test it out in the practice space too, pretty sure my drummer has DIs laying aroundd). Question - I would probably want to use my IR loader with that method for the direct signal, correct?

Yes definitely so you have cab emulation in the DI loop signal. If your IR has a balanced out and a pass-through jack then you don't even need a DI box.

The sonicake does have a balanced out XLR and unbalanced 1/4" out but thats it

You could pick up a captor and run it in pass thru mode so the live guitar goes to the cab with no attenuation, then run the output of the captor to the looping stuff so you're still getting the full tone of the amp in the looped signal. You can then slap an IR on and pass it to FOH/monitors. A bit sexier than just splitting from the FX loop and not much more effort

This is a great idea, and I already have a captor